Come to the main library in B110 at Mt Albert campus and see our fantastic graphic novels aka 'grown-up comics'. You will either find them on display downstairs (see photo below) or upstairs to the right in the Recreational Reading area near the group study area. Search our catalogue for your favourite characters or see this link for all our 'graphic novels' .

We will post updates about student printing issues to this blog as we get them.

Wednesday 24 October 2012, 12.30pm

Unitec IMS has been working hard to resolve the issues and Konica have informed us that the problem causing the printing issues has been resolved. We will keep you informed if problems reoccur.

Wednesday 24 October 2012, 11.58am

Unfortunately the student printing systems based in the Library and Student Computer
Centre are experiencing performance issues which are preventing student printing
on and off throughout the day. This is caused by a network problem that was
triggered last week by a power outage. Restarting the servers solves the
problem temporarily, but then the problem can reoccur a few minutes later. Unitec IMS
are investigating but we have no timeline yet as to when it will be resolved.
The Copy Centre which uses a different server and seems to be free of the issues
we are experiencing, therefore we are recommending that students use the Copy
Centre. See Copy Centre Opening Hours.

Friday, October 19, 2012

What is Open Access?

According to Peter Suber (Director of the Harvard Open Access Project)
“Open-access (OA) literature is digital, online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions. What makes it possible is the internet and the consent of the author or copyright-holder. “
For a fuller explanation see Peter’s introduction to Open Access.

Why is Open Access important?

Traditional journal subscription models are restricting access to research. Students, teachers and researchers need better access to research and Open Access is a viable solution. See this great handout with quotes from people about why they support Open Access and how it can help in many spheres of life. For more information see Peter Suber’s full overview.

What can I do?

Keep informed, lobby for your right to access research and get involved! Here are some ways for students to get involved:

Join the Right to Research CoalitionThis Coalition was founded by students in 2009 “to promote an open scholarly publishing system based on the belief that no student should be denied access to the articles they need because their institution cannot afford the often high cost of access. Since its launch, the Coalition has grown to represent nearly 7 million students internationally...”
See http://www.righttoresearch.org/about/index.shtml

Join the “make textbooks affordable” campaign"We're fighting to rein in costs by promoting cost-saving solutions on campus, while also tackling publishers' stranglehold on the market to change prices for good. We're educating students, faculty and bookstores, and raising awareness through research and the media. We're also calling on publishers, colleges and foundations to support the creation of more open-source textbooks that could save students millions each year.”
See http://studentpirgs.org/campaigns/sp/make-textbooks-affordable

Sign up at http://www.openaccessweek.org for access to all the support and resources you need, and to connect with the worldwide OA Week community.

Thursday, October 11, 2012

A big thank you to all students and staff who recently completed the Unitec
Library survey. There were over 2,000 responses. Library staff will be analysing your feedback with some preliminary results going up on the website before the end of the
academic year.

We are delighted to announce the
winners of the two iPads - Susan, a Nursing student based at Waitakere and
Dhruv, a Business student based at Mt Albert. Both were excited to get a
phone call from Rosanne van Leeuwen this week and are pictured here receiving
their iPads.

Again, thank you all for participating in our survey - your feedback will be
very valuable. And congratulations to our two winners.

Recent items added to Research Bank:

Adaptive reuse is a tool for retaining an
architectural object from demolition, preserving its historical value.
On the other hand, it can be perceived as a process of ‘building
evolution’ to fit with the urban environment ...

Though it is from the East that the sun rises,
showing itself bold and bright without a veil, it burns and blazes
with inward fire only when it escapes from the shackles of east and
west..."(3) - Muhammad Iqbal

This thesis research examines success factors for
transactional eCommerce Websites focusing on technical and business
contexts. Transactional websites in particular have become essential
for eCommerce development and use. ...

River flow forecasting models provide an essential
tool to manage water resources, address problems associated with both
excesses and deficits, and to find suitable solutions. With changing
climate and environmental ...